


Cats are Sadists and Bunnies are Cute

by cryingfanaticse



Category: Merlin (TV)
Genre: Bunnies, Cats, M/M, Merthur - Freeform, Swearing, dumb fluff
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-12-11
Updated: 2014-12-11
Packaged: 2018-03-01 00:08:45
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,447
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/2752253
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/cryingfanaticse/pseuds/cryingfanaticse
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Arthur's cat finds a bunny. Cats and bunnies are like oil and water, and what do you know, Merlin adopts a bunny.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Cats are Sadists and Bunnies are Cute

**Author's Note:**

> Imagine your OTP rescuing a baby rabbit. from otpprompts tumblr.

Merlin doesn't hate cats. He really doesn't. He understands that they can be sweet and lovable, and have the ability to cuddle the living shit out of you when they want to. But he also understands that cats are the most fucking sadistic predators to exist. When he was little, his mum gave him a full grown tom cat for Christmas. Today, he realizes it was less of a pet for him and more of an exterminator for the mice that ran up and down the sides of the house, sometimes scuttling across the kitchen floor, over his feet, and into whatever hidey hole they had created. Let it also be known that Merlin was down on the mouses side in Tom and Jerry.   
So when one day 8 year old Merlin woke up to the sounds of incessant squeaking, we was unprepared for the torture scene before him. The cat, poised over the mouse, obviously one of it's legs messed up beyond repair. The mouse was allowed to scuttle away for all of two seconds before being viciously ripped up into the mouth again and tossed like a bean bag. The gears of 8 year old Merlin had kicked in by then and he screamed. The cat looked at him with an air of annoyance, the mouse limped away, and 1 week later his mom excavated a dead mouse corpse that had begun to stink the kitchen. Cats were on and off. Sadists and cuddle masters, there was no inbetween and Merlin partook in none of it with his endless litany of rodents as a child, whether be rats, ferrets, or guinea pigs.

\---

12 years later and a much older Merlin is forced to once again recognize this crucial component of cats.

"Oi, Jerry! Sod it, Merlin, you let him out!" The small trashcan sized brown fluff ball had shot between Merlin's legs as he opened the door to Arthur's, and dammit it wasn't his fault that the stunted bear had decided its destiny was to pull a Thoreau and live off the wild.   
Merlin had the warning of pounding feet and then Arther was throwing himself out the door after the cat.   
"Jerry! Jerry, come back, kitty, kitty, kitty! Merlin, help me, it was your fault!" 

"Arthur, help yourself, Jerry has been trying to get out since it turned cold enough for him to go outside without a heat stroke! Probably trying to skip out on you calling him that utterly horrific name, which is NOT ironic no matter how many times you insist."

"Dammit, Merlin, he's going into the fields. And of course you wouldn't appreciate the finer arts of irony, Merlin." With a huffy face, Arthur chased after the cat. In his tanktop and boxers. In fucking 0 C. In all honestly, Merlin considered letting Arthur and Jerry run away together. Jerry would be the leader of the pack because Arthur had the common sense of a twig.... But Jerry was also as spoiled as a mini-tiger could be so Merlin imagined they'd both be found years in the future, frozen together. "Feline and Domesticated Arthur." It would read. People would ooo, and ahhh, take pictures of the ass that probably not even time could ruin....  
Fuck, Merlin needed to get it together. 

"Dammit Arthur, you clotpole! The things I do for you, god..." Was his last mutter as he dashed in to retrieve Arthur's long coat and back after said man and his cat.  
__

Merlin found him in the deep in the field. He was hardly out of breath, but Merlin was panting, and chill was wearing off. Arthur, however looking freezing.  
"Jerry! Heerreeee, kitty, kitty, kitty!"   
"Arthur take you coat."   
"No, Merlin, I'm rescuing my cat, here kitty ,kitty ,kitty!"  
Merlin didn't know whether to strangle him or smother him with the expensive coat, but he wasn't given the chance to survive as a strangled almost cartoonish sound rang out to their right.  
"Jerry? Fuck, Jerry, I'm coming!" And Arthur was haring off again.  
Merlin guessed he could consider it cute the way Arthur cared after the thing, if it wasn't fucking 0C and he was sure the Jerry hadn't made that noise. 

"Jerry!" Merlin watches as Arthur embraces the beast, who begins to cuddle up to him as if he hadn't just abandoned him for the call of the wild 4 minutes ago. Merlin notices though that Jerry seems to keep glancing at a specific spot on the ground, towards the bushes, and jogs to investigate.   
It's dark, but he can hear the sound of labored breathing, and beats back one of the branches to spread light. A bunny, obviously a baby, is lying on its side, eyes bugging out of its head and leg crooked behind it at a foreign angle. Merlin's heart beat a painful thumb when he sees the tackying blood that correlates at the bunny's chest and dots it's back.

"Merlin? What are you doddling over?"

Merlin's only response is a harsh SHHHH, and with deft hands he covers bunny's eyes, preventing further panic, and carefully scoops it up. He cradles it, attempting to keep the leg from jostling. Arthur is staring at him like an idiot, a fluffed out and is glaring at the bunny with the eyes of a killer. Merlin shoots the cat a glare as if to say 'fuck off' and turns the bunny from the cats view. 

"Your Jerry has just mutilated an infant. How do you feel?"

"Fuck, Merlin, you aren't going to keep it are you? Remember the squirrel...? And Merlin, he's a cat, this is what cats DO."

"I don't follow your standards, Arthur and none of that puppy eye stuff can convince me so just stoppit. And mutiliate babies is it? Funny why any one would want to keep them. And don't let that CAT anywhere near Peaches."

"Peaches? Are we at the farmer's market Merlin? Cats are insanely cuddly and you just suffer from a drop to the head apparently Merlin."  
Arthur paused a moment.   
"Fuck, it's cold."

Merlin began to purposely enfold the Bunny, who was shivering in periodic intervals, with the fancy black coat.  
"Merlin. No."  
"Merlin, yes." Merlin said simply, tucking the bunny in a pocket of cloth. Arthur stared at him and Merlin could see the fight building up in his eyes. With a well aimed puppy dog look, saw the exhale of white breath that meant, yeah, the bunny got the jacket.

"Let's get inside, it's freezing. Isn't that right Mister Jerry? Yes, Yes it is." Arthur cuddled the cat up to him and began the trudge back to the country house, Merlin following a few steps behind. Jerry shot looks at Merlin, and Merlin glared right back. 'This is MY bunny.'  
****

"Arthur, I need to borrow your keys."   
"Okay." Was all the blissed out on hot chocolate and blanket enswaddled Arthur sighed as Merlin snatched the keys and was out the door, one arm of bunny and going to the vet.

****  
In the end, Arthur eventually felt the guilt of his pet almost killing his best friends baby pet, visiting everyday with bundles of carrots and strawberries, so much that Merlin had to take half for himself to eat. Peaches recovered, but was nippish when Arthur pet her and one day, when Merlin went to Arthur's house for a Bond marathon, Jerry sat on his lap.   
"Welcome to the family." Arthur had said, but it came out less like a joke and more like a nervous question and Merlin was confused. Confused until he looked at Arthur, in a ridiculously posh sweater covered in cat hair and with the expression of someone who was unbearably confused at why they hadn't said that confidently and hoping the other wouldn't notice. Merlin noticed. From the dedication to the resident sadist Jerry to his fine ass and utter inability to think ahead for cold weather (Merlin was confident he would be something akin to a frozen form permeantly made a part of Brittain's landscape if not for him) made Merlin thought why not.   
With the air of someone who didn't really think it mattered anymore, Merlin flicked his eyes to Arthur's lips and leaned in. Arthur's wide eyed stare thankfully turned a bit more keen as he shortened the distance.  
Then there was a yowl, a "SHIT", and laughing as Jerry shot off of Merlin's lap with a quick dig of claws, and then much snogging.   
"Jerry is never going to meet Peaches. Deal?"  
"Deal."   
And then silence. 

****  
SIX MONTHS LATER

"Merlin, Peaches is not allowed at the table!"   
"Arthur, Peaches has more table manners than you."  
"Dammit, Merlin no."  
"Merlin, yes."


End file.
